By way of background regarding conventional systems, electronic solutions for document search, document review, document comparison, efficient document modification, and/or merging of documents are limited in scope and functionality which, for example, requires large amounts of manual interaction and management across numerous data repositories, formats, and/or platforms. For example, a first document may be created in a source format (e.g., Microsoft® Word®) in a first repository, such as a directory or folder related to a mobile or desktop device associate with the author and/or containing other electronic documents. As the first document is shared or as copies are propagated to other users, e.g., such as by placing on a network share, via email, etc., the first document may be eventually rendered in a format different from the source format (e.g., such as portable document format (PDF), hypertext markup language (HTML), etc.).
In addition, as the copies of the first document propagate, they may become the subject of further revisions, for example, such as additions, deletions, modifications, comments, updates, links, additions of metadata, or otherwise, and so on. In order to keep apprised of such changes, or to compare various versions that may exist, the author or other user is typically required to open one document with its native application (e.g., Microsoft® Word®) and select a second document from within that native application, to generate a comparison document. Moreover, such conventional solutions are typically limited to comparing one version of a document with the original document or another version of the document.
However, various problems arise from this situation. As one example, each of the documents to be compared must be supported by the native application. As a further example, generally speaking, a Word® document cannot be compared to another document of a disparate format unless that disparate format is supported in the native application. In another example, a comparison of one document may only able to be compared to one other document at a time, especially in the case of proprietary document formats. Accordingly, where changes or differences may exist between the first document and any of a number of the propagated copies, the ability to track, review, compare, efficiently modify, and/or merge such changes or differences is typically limited to documents of the same format, and/or limited to, time-consuming manual one-on-one comparisons. In addition, conventional solutions for finding and replacing data associated with media content across numerous data repositories, and/or in disparate formats and/or platforms are similarly limited.
For instance, upon receiving a document for review electronically, a reviewer typically does not directly edit a document, and/or insert the desired changes or comments. A document-editing tool typically must be set in a mode so that the tool tracks changes made by the reviewer. If a reviewer performs the review using a tool that allows only annotation but not editing of the document, every change and/or comment needs to be specifically marked using the tool instead of simply updating the document. In addition, after completing the review, each reviewer sends the reviewed document back to the author either through the same or a different electronic system. The author can either print the original and reviewed documents and compares them outside the electronic system or can compare two documents at a time (either the original document and one reviewed document or two reviewed documents).
The above-described deficiencies of conventional solutions for document review, document comparison, document modification, and/or merging of documents are merely intended to provide an overview of some of the problems of conventional systems, and are not intended to be exhaustive. Other problems with the state of the art and corresponding aspects of some of the various non-limiting embodiments may become further apparent upon review of the following detailed description.